So, I had this on my tumblr, but I found it pretty amusing and pretty accurate if I do say so myself. haha, No I think the good looking part is debatable. I think its more foreign people seem more attractive because they are different (especially in countries where everyone looks mostly the same because there isn't a lot of diversity), but who knows.  Oh yeah, and btw I'm not swiching to just tumblr, obviously.  I'm still figuring out which I like better so for now I have both!

Happy Independence Day Indonesia!

Thanks to my fellow YES alum friends on facebook, I found out that today is Indonesia’s Independence day! Unfortunately, I wasn’t there to celebrate, but I still dressed up in red and white with my little homemade Indonesian flag to show my support! 

Here’s a little history about Indonesia’s Independence (thank you Wikipedia)

Sukarno- 1st President

On August 17th, 1945, Indonesia declared its independence from the Netherlands in a Proclamation of Indonesian Independence.  After several years of struggle, Indonesia became free of hundreds of years of imperialistic power by the Dutch and shortly by the Japanese, and became its own republic. Nationalist war hero, Sukarno, became Indonesia’s first president following the country’s independence, after overcoming colonial opposition and imprisonment. He served as a figurehead in the new Indonesian government for 22 years, while the country got off to a rocky start with disagreements over which type of government Indonesia would have. His idea of ‘guided democracy’ was viewed as too autocratic by some, and eventually the system failed.  He was replaced by Suharto, who established a military-based, centralized government, that was successful initially, but later caused controversy. Eventually Suharto resigned from the presidency, and led way to the representative democracy that Indonesia has today.
Ok, I tried to sum up a lot of info into a short-ish paragraph, so hopefully i got the gist of it. Dirgahayu RI! ( i think this means Long live Indonesia!)

We Are Family

First off, excuse my cheesy blog title. Someone’s blog I read used songs for the titles and this popped into my head, but I won’t make a habit of it.  So I have some great news and some bad news, but I’ll start with the great news: I got my host family! I would tell you the name of their family, but apparently Indonesians in the same family don’t have the same last names, its very confusing. But anyways, here they are!!

My host dad, Deni, and host brother, Egi, are in the back, and my sisters, Amanda and Novita, are in the front with my host mom, Rita. Amanda is 15, Egi is 20 or 21, and Novita is 22.  The older two are in college, but live at home (that’s the norm in Indonesia) and my younger sister goes to the school that I will be going to, so I will have a chance to get to know them all well.  My host dad is a banker and my host mom is a lecturer at a university! Also there is a cat Pocky, and 2 bunnies!! Basically, the perfect family :D





 My host family lives in Bandung, Indonesia, which is the 3rd largest city in the country and is on the island of Java not to far from the capital city, Jakarta. It’s known for its ‘cool’ temperature, beautiful surrounding scenery, good food, and great outlet shopping! It sounds perfect! I’m happy to be in a city (I google-mapped my family’s address and they are right in the middle of the city!), but without quite as much traffic and pollution as Jakarta.  I made a little collage of pictures of Bandung, but I doubt they really represent it well.  Here it is though:

 And now the bad news :(.  AFS is having some problems with our visas, so out departure date has been pushed back two weeks from Sept. 5th to the 21st! Now my countdown is way back to 36 days- which seems so long! I still super grateful to be going though, so I will just have to use this time to do college apps and learn more Indonesian before I go! Plus I do get a little more time with my family which is nice.  I can’t wait to get there though, the closer it gets the more excited I am! And also, there are lots of YES inbound alum (Indonesian kids who came to the U.S. last year on an exchange) living in Bandung, so I have already been talking to them and planning to meet up! Hopefully the wait goes by fast, so I can actually start blogging about my year!!

The Countdown Begins!

As of today I have 100 days left in the U.S.!! So 99 days until I say goodbye to all my friends and family for a year and head to NYC for my gateway orientation on September 5th.  Then after one night in NYC and roughly 22 hours of flying time (given none of my flights get delayed or there is a freak storm and i have to spend the night in the airport) I will arrive in Jakarta with the worst jet lag I've ever experienced. But none of that will matter because I'm going to be so excited and probably on an 'I'm in Indonesia, halfway around the world, gonna be here for 10 months, about to meet my host family, no turning back!!!' high and I'm sure the last thing on my mind will be the fact that I should be sleeping because at home its the middle of the night there.  Anyways, even though 100 days is still a long way away, the fact that I'm leaving has finally sunk in a little.  School ended about a week ago, and realizing that I will never be going back to school at Wheeler (my high school) made it all seem more real.

So on another note, I've had several AFS events recently and since some of the YES'ers are leaving at the end of June (so soon!) we've already been doing a lot of preparation.  In April I had an at home interview with an AFS volunteer who went to Malaysia when she was in high school (not with YES though)  so she could find out more about me to help place me with a host family and so I could ask her general questions. It was really laid back and it was mostly just questions about my personality, what I like to do, and how my family works.  Then a few weeks back I had my AFS per-departure orientation for the Georgia chapter.  I was the only YES kid there, but there were 2 kids for NSLI-Y (another department of state scholarship), and a few people who are paying to go abroad on a regular AFS exchange.  The PDO (pre-departure orientation) was also combined with the pre-return orientation for the exchange students from other countries who have been living in the Atlanta area this year.  I got to talk to some girls from Thailand, a girl from Turkey, and most importantly this guy Ari who is from Indonesia.  It was really interesting to hear their stories, and I learned some useful things about Indonesia, like the fact that in school if I'm talking to a guy I should probably stand at least 2 feet away from him at all times. Apparently school is strict but outside of school it doesn't matter. haha Not sure if this is an exaggeration, but I guess I'll find out! So at the orientation we had a bunch of  info sessions which were mainly about things that had already been gone over on a conference call or in Denver at the selection event. We also had a sex, drugs, and alcohol session (thought i was done with that after health this year!) which basically told us about everything that could get us kicked out of the program.  It wasn't all bad though because there was a hilarious story about a kid who had an affair with his host mom- I think I'll spare you the details. Oh also this is completely unrelated but i also learned that I like real coffee- like just plain coffee and some milk- at the orientation (i usually only like Starbucks frappuccinos but I was really tired so i tried it) or maybe they just had abnormally good coffee.

So here is me and everyone who is going on an exchange from the U.S. at the orientation.  They were all really cool and this one girl Brianna taught me/made me to try this circus lift/stunt thing which was a bit awkward because it involved me having to put my head between her legs for a second there. haha sorry i don't have a picture of that. Anyways here we are:

That's me, second to the right with the poofy hair, if you don't know.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Alright so the last and most recent YES related thing I've done is my second conference call.  It was pretty much the same as the first, they told us a bunch of information that we had already read in emails, but this time we had a few articles to read as a homework assignment and we discussed them. I'm looking forward to the Indonesian only conference call, because right now we can't really ask most of our questions because there are like 6 different countries on the call. 
So I have to get back to doing work for my summer classes. I'm taking World Lit, Econ, and Government this summer since I'm not getting graduation credits next year while I'm gone :( But the good thing is I don't have to stress out about getting good grades in school as much while I'm there-trying to figure out what's going on will be hard enough! So that's gonna be most of my summer till mid-July , but I have a week long trip to Costa Rica in 2 days with my school's leadership club!!!!, and then the PDO in D.C. at the end of June, and probably a few trips to visit family. And then... INDONESIA!!!

Finally a Finalist!!!

I just found a few days ago that I am a finalist for the YES program in Indonesia!!! When I found out i was speechless for a minute or so and then i literally started screaming and jumping up and down and clapping like an idiot. I ran out onto my deck and called my best friend and my sister- both of which didn't answer there phones at first! but i called back until they finally picked up, and meanwhile started crying because I was so happy (hey, I'm not the only one! ask the other finalists if you don't believe me) I can't believe that I actually got in and that everything I have been dreaming about doing next year for the past few months is going to be my reality.  It hasn't really sunk in yet that I am going to be living a completely different life next year and I can hardly imagine being half way around the world even for a trip, let alone an entire school year!  I'm sure that i will start freaking out and get really sad as the school ends this year and it really sets in that I am leaving all my friends and family behind, but right now I am just sooooooo excited and can't stop thinking about next year! I don't know how I am going to focus on my classes for the next month or so, but as much as I wish I could hurry up and get there already, I know that I need to make the most of the next 3 months with everyone and spend as much time with my friends and family as possible.  I'm so happy that 2 of my fellow group H'ers from the Denver in person selection event, Julianne and Hamza, have also been accepted to Indonesia (I will post a list of everyone else's blogs for all the countries soon) and I can't wait to see all my friends again in D.C.! Unfortunately not everyone made it, and some really amazing people who I was hoping to see again did not get selected as finalists :(  Some are alternates though, and if any of you are reading this i'm wishing you good luck! You guys were all so awesome; there wasn't one person I met in Denver that i didn't like or that I felt didn't deserve to get in!  For everyone else reading this blog who may be interested in the program, I will definitely make a post about how to apply and how the admissions process works really soon! I'll get back to you soon when I get more updates about my host family, host city, and departure date!!! This is so crazy! somebody pinch me.